Think
of Kentucky straight Bourbon whiskey and a picture of racehorses
grazing on rolling hills might come to mind, but few would conjure an
image of the open sea. However, that's exactly the vision that
Jefferson’s Bourbon is channeling with its new Ocean, Aged at Sea, a
whiskey that did most of its aging while rolling through 10,000 miles of
waves.

If
you mull it over historically it's an idea that makes some sense. A few
centuries ago still men across the globe independently lit up to the
idea that aging spirits was an excellent way to improve them. And, in
many cases, that insight came at the end of having shipped liquor in a
cask from Point A to Point B and finding it tasted better at the
destination. The time in the wood in sweltering holds had
serendipitously matured the whiskey, rum or brandy. Soon, spirits makers
were doing their aging before shipping in the more controlled
environment of a rickhouse.

Enter
Trey Zoeller hundreds of years later. The founder of Jefferson’s, a
negotiant of Bourbons and ryes, was locked in late night discussion with
friends when he advanced the idea that whiskey might also profit from
the agitation that the motion of the ship affords. “Typically I don’t
follow through on drunk talk,” he says with a wry grin. “But this time I
did.”

The
idea was to store barrels on one of his companion’s ships, a 120-foot
Russian trawler that was getting on in years. Most of what Zoeller deals
in has aged to some extent when he buys it, but in this case he
barreled new-make whiskey and sent it off to sea, where it became quite
the tourist, making six passages through the Panama Canal and crossing
the equator. The Bourbon sloshed around for three-and-a-half years
before coming back to Kentucky where it was further matured to bring its
age to more than four years.

The
result is a whiskey that is intensely colored and flavorful in light of
its age. Zoeller lays that to two factors. The motion that the ship
imparted on the casks (he likens it to a paint can in a shaker)
certainly caused accelerated interaction with the wood. Zoeller adds
that the temperature in the hold often topped 120° Fahrenheit as it
sailed the tropics.

After three-and-half-years at sea, Zoeller's Bourbon had turned nearly black.

“It
totally exceeded my expectations,” says the producer. “It actually
caramelized.” He compares it to a dark rum, young but with a lot of
composition. In fact, Zoeller thinks of the whiskey as having three
separate influences: its birth in Kentucky, the temperature conditions
enjoyed by a Caribbean rum, and the salt air atmosphere weathered by an
Islay whisky.

The
first batch, now rolling out in select stores, lost quite a bit of
volume from the five barrels. Zoeller attributed that to a large angel’s
share (alcohol lost in evaporation), the failure of some barrels under
the stress of sea travel and what he suspects may have been sampling
while at sea. The price of a bottle is $200 (compare that to his entry
level Jefferson’s at $30).

While
the small batch only afforded 250 bottles, Zoeller says, he is so
excited with the results, “We are going to keep experimenting until we
get it down to a science.” In a separate trial he has also stored
barrels in duck blinds in secret locations across the country in an
attempt to tap into that particular atmosphere. Zoeller further plans to
try shipping whiskey from Kentucky down the Ohio and Mississippi rivers
on barges. This would mirror the conditions under which Bourbon makers
first discovered aging in the late eighteenth century: barrels were
shipped on flatboats to New Orleans where they had improved in flavor
even in the few months the trip took.

Although
Zoeller does not reveal the source of the whiskey he bottles, he did
disclose that he had it made with a higher rye content (about 30
percent) than is typical. Bourbon must have at least 51 percent corn in
its grain recipe. Most use far more than that. The rest is usually made
up of rye and barley.

APPEARANCE:
Very dark copper color (almost maple syrup) with formidable legs that
drip down the glass like a lazy comet with a fat head and thinner tail.

NOSE:
Maple candy on first flush, the whiskey soon begins to release an
elegant floral character as well as caramel and toffee. At the very end
there is the reminder of the woodiness of a handle of a Louisville
Slugger.

PALATE:
Intense hard candy and maple syrup when it first hits the mouth. As the
whiskey opens up across the palate out comes a huge spice quotient with
mounds of licorice and nutmeg.

FINISH: The licorice informs the rather long finish, until it’s replaced with wild cherry at the very end of the voyage.

CIGAR
PAIRING: We paired with the Padrón 1964 Anniverary Maduro Superior (6½
inches by 42 ring gauge, 89 points in the October 2012 issue of Cigar
Aficionado, $10.10) a medium-to-full-bodied lonsdale with a wide
spectrum of flavors including coffee, toast, nuts and vanilla. The two
products hit it off right away. First, the nuttiness of the cigar found a
similar, previously dormant partner in the Bourbon. Then they danced
off together as the whiskey revealed sweetness and chocolate in the
cigar and together they became a candy bar of toffee, cocoa, nuts and
nougat.

I'll have to convince myself (and wife)! to pay that price. But I admire Zoeller's approach. If I can even find it, it will have a home in my home right next to another bottle of Zoeller's creations, his 18 year old "Presidential Select"!

John McEvoyNew York, NY, 10013, March 3, 2014 2:10pm ET

I would like to use an excerpt from this article for a book I am writing about mezcal. How can I gain permission to do so? You can check out my website at mezcalphd.com. Thank you.